Before the previous owners sold the laundromat, it was a particularly well-kept place. The attendants were generally polite and even friendly. The one who worked on week nights got so she recognized us. “Don’t use those dryers,” she told me once. “They don’t work as well as these over here.” She was right, and I thanked her. The floors were always swept clean, the old magazines under the front counter were always neatly stacked, everything was always neat and tidy. And on top of each washing machine, next to the opening where you put in your laundry detergent, they put little measuring cups saved from the tops of discarded jugs of liquid detergent; the measuring cups rested on little squares of terry cloth, obviously cut out of abandoned towels but always freshly laundered. More than once, we found it quite convenient to have these measuring cups and squares of terry cloth so easily available.

At the beginning of the summer, a big sign appeared in the window: “Under New Management!” the sign said, and on the next line, “Free Coffee!!” The free coffee lasted a few weeks and then went away. Our friendly attendant disappeared not long after that. The floors were no longer swept quite so neatly. And tonight I noticed that several of the little measuring cups and their squares of terry cloth have disappeared.

Or put it this way: tonight I suddenly noticed that macroscopic irreversibility was happening in our favorite laundromat from one week to the next. It is perhaps exciting to see an example of a fundamental law of physics in action. But I would prefer it if the new management worked harder so as to make it appear as if the second law of thermodynamics did not apply within the isolated system of the laundromat.